Although the upper echelons of the music industry, the major labels, are not exactly renowned for releasing street-credible stuff with cojones anymore, things used to be quite different 30 years ago. One of the most prolific crossover albums of the 1990s did come out on Epic, a Sony Music subsidiary founded in the 1950s. I’ve no idea how the sophomore album by RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE was sold to the board members of the label, but the world owes a great debt of gratitude for their decision to release something like that. The thing is, “Evil Empire” pushed the limits a lot, both musically and lyrically, and, in my books, it remains the riskiest and least mainstream of all the RATM albums. Their eponymous debut had sure felt like a punch in the face a few years earlier, even for a metalhead who had been exposed to all sorts of crossover hybrids of punk, thrash metal, funk, and hip-hop in the late 1980s; yeah, do you remember, that used to be the coolest shit in town – mixing all THAT in the same sonic bowl à la ANTHRAX, FAITH NO MORE, FISHBONE, LIVING COLOUR, and maybe even RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS and THE BEASTIE BOYS to a degree?! By the mid-1990s, antics such as these weren’t very much in vogue anymore, though. Then, along came this beast, throwing in the razor-sharp riffs of metal, elastic grooves of James Brown and the like, and sprinkling it all with a healthy dose of that street-hardened attitude of PUBLIC ENEMY and NWA. These punks made it all sound cool again – cooler than ever before. Of course, the album holds quite a lot of nostalgic weight for us 1990s kids, but even if you disregard all that, it’s hard to disagree that the album was charged with such unstoppable force that its cataclysmic impact can still be felt, decades later. People who didn’t even like the band so much at the time are likely to recognize the first two bangers – “People of the Sun” and “Bulls on Parade” – because they got such heavy rotation on MTV and radio, but even the “unknown” tracks slaps exceptionally hard. In retrospect, this sophomore outing remains the band’s most consistently great album altogether.
There are two things to bring up when talking about RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE – the politically charged, incendiary lyrics and Tom Morello‘s unorthodox approach to guitar playing. Even the album title is a political reference, taken from a saying by former US President Ronald Reagan, who described the Soviet Union as the ”Evil Empire.” There is a distinct anti-establishment (or anti-imperialistic, to be more precise) sentiment overarching the song selection. What makes this trait particularly hilarious, in retrospect, is the fact that some people are just now beginning to realize how politically charged the band has always been, right from the beginning. I’m talking about the demographic of casual fans who go, “I used to be a fan until your political opinions came out.” Oh, really, Karen? Did you even pay attention to the lyrics, like ever? Morello has tweeted some pretty snappy responses to haters of this sort in recent years, like the time when someone tried to be sarcastic on Twitter and he replied, “One does not have to be an honors grad in political science from Harvard University to recognize the unethical and inhumane nature of this administration but well, I happen to be an honors grad in political science from Harvard University, so I can confirm that for you.” Then, on another occasion, some random dude silenced a Karen by asking, “What ‘Machine’ did you think he [Morello] was raging against? The dishwasher?” While I’m not the biggest advocate for mixing music and politics, I must hand it to the band: they pulled it off just perfectly! RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE felt every bit as real as the ideals they touted – it was not an act.
Then, the other unique aspect in the band’s music is something you simply cannot miss: Morello‘s nothing short of unorthodox guitarism, which has been described as a “Molotov cocktail of killer riffs, Whammy pedal abuse, and toggle switching” by Guitar World magazine. I’m pretty sure everyone can recall the first time they heard him play a guitar solo: most likely it was one of those glitchy-switchy type of things where Morello sounded as though trying to impersonate a hip-hop DJ scratching vinyls. Back in the day, these iconic guitar leads were either viewed as hot garbage or revolutionary mission statements against the clichés of 1980s hair-metal guitar solos, depending on whether you were into the pyrotechnical side of things or not. I might be biased here, of course, but for the life of me, I cannot see how the tweedly-tweedly-Yngwie–Malmsteen stuff would have fitted funky riffers such as these – this wasn’t a homage to late Frank Zappa, for fuck’s sake! To me, these glitchy-bitsy guitar licks sounded like a breath of fresh air back in the day – and I used to play the guitar myself when this album came out, mind you.
When it comes to guitar riffs, the album is a cornucopia of earworms. Not only did the two biggest hits stick to your head immediately, but the other tracks roll out killer riffs, one after another, just as well. Considering the topics of the songs, ranging from the idea of mass media controlling people’s perspectives in “Vietnow” to the exploitation of illegal immigrants in “Without A Face”, the riffs do a marvellous job at driving the point home with an angry bite. While the big hits were nominated for Grammys, it was the track, “Tire Me,” that scooped the Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance in 1996. I guess it speaks volumes about the album’s riff quality that you can basically pick any riffer at random and it will make a killing.
And speaking of angry bite, Zack de la Rocha‘s vocal delivery is prominently vehement throughout the album, with his weapon of choice being screaming to the point of distortion. Maybe the vocal track has been fed through a little bit of tube overdrive or something, but the effect is pretty resonant all the same. The odd-one-out is the song, “Revolver,” in which he opted for whispering the lyrics instead of belting out his trademark screams. This approach works pretty nicely amidst all the screaming!
Another spicy track, “Wind Below,” references indigenous revolutionaries of Mexico, once again calling out the propaganda machine of the private mass media. If you presented the lyrics to someone not familiar with the band, I reckon they might mistake the topic for something far more recent. So, either the band was years ahead of their time, or history just keeps repeating itself ad nauseam. Then again, these options are not mutually exclusive.
“Year of Tha Boomerang” brings the album’s anti-imperialistic themes to a full circle. I guess there are only two viable approaches to being anti-establishment and still sounding good. You can either resort to dark humor, keeping in mind that Oscar Wilde quote about telling the truth by making people laugh in order not to get done by the lynch mobs. Or, you can simply call the spade a spade, no matter how ugly it sounds. Frank Zappa chose the first option, using lethal amounts of sarcasm back in the day; he once said that politics were merely the entertainment section of the military-industrial complex. RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE opted for the more evocative possibilities of the latter option with these songs. For instance, the line in the lyrics, “I got no property, but yo, I’m a piece of it,” wraps the predicament of the modern way of life in the West rather grimly, but very accurately. It resonated with a ring of truth 30 years ago and even more so now. So, all in all, this sophomore RATM affair was an improvement in almost every aspect from the debut: the songcraft is tighter, the execution is sharper, and the attitude is even more in-your-face. The best description I’ve seen about this album was something like this: music that makes you jump, vocals that make you scream, and lyrics that make you take a deep breath and think. ‘Nuff said.
Written by Jani Lehtinen
Tracklist
- People of the Sun
- Bulls on Parade
- Vietnow
- Revolver
- Snakecharmer
- Tire Me
- Down Rodeo
- Without A Face
- Wind Below
- Roll Right
- Year of Tha Boomerang
Lineup
Zach de la Rocha – vocals
Tom Morello – guitars
Tim Bob – bass
Brad Wilk – drums
Label
Epic
